Do you craft/choose your thoughts before you have them?

[SpeedOfSound]

What is interesting about how we think is that we are only willing to blame a person for something if are certain that he was conscious of what he is doing. Even though it has been shown that anything that we do consciously is supported by hundreds if not thousands of unconscious process.

i think this is our homuncular or dualist thinking. If science finds a cause for some thinking then we automatically excuse that thinking and go in search of the immaterial soul and try to find out what is left over that the soul is responsible for.

We end up thinking that we have this instantaneous vote power and it flows from a soul that is actually in charge of everything.

[SpeedOfSound]

Wouldn't it be interesting to get the mystic master who is always living completely in the moment and put him through the change blindness experiment to see if he can tell that he is being fooled?

[SpeedOfSound]

I would like to introduce a couple of technical terms to describe the naive idealists basic gambit.
The first is the habit of always slipping the homunculus into the cracks somewhere. Into the quantum states, or chaotic systems, or some introspective drivel about feeling like a bat.

Slip the Homuculus In There or SHIT

Next is the obfuscation achieved by lipping deep philosophical insights or perhaps by jumping from subjective to objective categories.

Basic Undulating Loquacious Labiating or BULL

Combine as you wish.

[FBM]

You said earlier that you didn't want to split hairs over theories. I'm confused. Do you want to know how things really are or how we experience them and think they are?

Both, preferably. Then I want to compare them and find out if there are any discrepancies.

[FBM]

There's a grammar to be obeyed, vocabulary chosen, etc. How and when does all this happen, and if it's an unconscious process, how can it be considered to be volitional?

There is a bunch of painstaking studies that show the processes of speech and reading are completely unconscious until something goes wrong. Most of these studies are boring as hell and I haven't read them. I'm mostly taking other neuroscientists at their word here.

There was one study that Baars talks about that I am desperately trying to find...I'll keep looking for that to see if I explained it right. It was pretty stunning. It seems like we backfill our conscious recollection of things so they make sense to us. Words on pages don't change so we refuse to experience them changing even if they really do change.

Holy shit, yes, please try to find the source of that anecdote. Sounds fascinating and perfectly relevant to the sort of thing I'm trying to figure out.

[FBM]

What is interesting about how we think is that we are only willing to blame a person for something if are certain that he was conscious of what he is doing. Even though it has been shown that anything that we do consciously is supported by hundreds if not thousands of unconscious process.

i think this is our homuncular or dualist thinking. If science finds a cause for some thinking then we automatically excuse that thinking and go in search of the immaterial soul and try to find out what is left over that the soul is responsible for.

We end up thinking that we have this instantaneous vote power and it flows from a soul that is actually in charge of everything.

I suspect this is very probably the case, except in the case of people who don't believe in a soul. I think that soul has been replaced by Self, and practically speaking, it seems to serve much the same role, minus the immortality part, that is.

Wouldn't it be interesting to get the mystic master who is always living completely in the moment and put him through the change blindness experiment to see if he can tell that he is being fooled?

Heh heh heh heh...

I would like to introduce a couple of technical terms to describe the naive idealists basic gambit.
The first is the habit of always slipping the homunculus into the cracks somewhere. Into the quantum states, or chaotic systems, or some introspective drivel about feeling like a bat.

Slip the Homuculus In There or SHIT

I suspect that Self is playing the role of homunculus for many people.

Next is the obfuscation achieved by lipping deep philosophical insights or perhaps by jumping from subjective to objective categories.

Or from concrete to abstract, from (assumed) substance to properties, to emergent properties, etc. Yes, this sort of thing is either sloppy or disingenuous. The certainty bias tends to make people justify all sorts of linguistic acrobatics. I'd like to avoid that by asking more questions and making fewer dogmatic assertions. Sometimes I slip up on that, of course.

Basic Undulating Loquacious Labiating or BULL

Combine as you wish.

[SpeedOfSound]

There's a grammar to be obeyed, vocabulary chosen, etc. How and when does all this happen, and if it's an unconscious process, how can it be considered to be volitional?

There is a bunch of painstaking studies that show the processes of speech and reading are completely unconscious until something goes wrong. Most of these studies are boring as hell and I haven't read them. I'm mostly taking other neuroscientists at their word here.

There was one study that Baars talks about that I am desperately trying to find...I'll keep looking for that to see if I explained it right. It was pretty stunning. It seems like we backfill our conscious recollection of things so they make sense to us. Words on pages don't change so we refuse to experience them changing even if they really do change.

Holy shit, yes, please try to find the source of that anecdote. Sounds fascinating and perfectly relevant to the sort of thing I'm trying to figure out.

I scanned his books quickly to no avail. I am rereading two of them currently and I will let you know as soon as I find it.

A Cognitive Theory of Consciousness
In the Theater of Consciousness.

Bernard Baars. My main man.

[FBM]

There's a grammar to be obeyed, vocabulary chosen, etc. How and when does all this happen, and if it's an unconscious process, how can it be considered to be volitional?

There is a bunch of painstaking studies that show the processes of speech and reading are completely unconscious until something goes wrong. Most of these studies are boring as hell and I haven't read them. I'm mostly taking other neuroscientists at their word here.

There was one study that Baars talks about that I am desperately trying to find...I'll keep looking for that to see if I explained it right. It was pretty stunning. It seems like we backfill our conscious recollection of things so they make sense to us. Words on pages don't change so we refuse to experience them changing even if they really do change.

Holy shit, yes, please try to find the source of that anecdote. Sounds fascinating and perfectly relevant to the sort of thing I'm trying to figure out.

I scanned his books quickly to no avail. I am rereading two of them currently and I will let you know as soon as I find it.

Gracioso. I'll see if I can track some reference to it online.

[charlou]

What is interesting about how we think is that we are only willing to blame a person for something if are certain that he was conscious of what he is doing. Even though it has been shown that anything that we do consciously is supported by hundreds if not thousands of unconscious process.

i think this is our homuncular or dualist thinking. If science finds a cause for some thinking then we automatically excuse that thinking and go in search of the immaterial soul and try to find out what is left over that the soul is responsible for.

We end up thinking that we have this instantaneous vote power and it flows from a soul that is actually in charge of everything.

I don't. I grew up being told that is the case, but have since learned it's not and am very comfortable with that understanding. I accept that it is neuron based and mediated by our neurochemistry and culture. No soul/extrinsic entity required.

[Hermit]

I accept that it is neuron based and mediated by our neurochemistry and culture. No soul/extrinsic entity required.

That's basically it for me. One of the intellectual hurdles the vast majority of people can't seem to vault is the concept that there must be something fundamentally existing other than matter. The prejudice that "there must be something more than that" is almost universal.

To me a car is more than the sum of its parts, in so far as the configuration of those parts makes that heap of metal, plastic, rubber and fuel capable of things which those components would not otherwise have, but I challenge anybody to pull one apart and then show me the leftover called driveability. Same goes for the mind, thinking, consciousness or whatever.

[GoodSmeagol]

I have thoughts, THEN craft and choose them depending on my goals.
I have many thoughts yet act on only a few, am I alone?

[NoFreeWill]

I have thoughts, THEN craft and choose them depending on my goals.
I have many thoughts yet act on only a few, am I alone?

No, FBM is asking if you craft your thoughts before you have them

[SpeedOfSound]

Does anyone have a good example of crafting a thought?

[NoFreeWill]

Does anyone have a good example of crafting a thought?

Maybe if you chose to solve a particular problem then the thought the finally led you to the solution might be said to have been crafted.

[FBM]

Does anyone have a good example of crafting a thought?

Insofar as 'crafting' implies volition, no I don't have any examples. I'm not going to rule out that others may, though. That was pretty much what the OP was about. Finding out whether or not others do, I mean.